PHILADELPHIA — The latest phase of Danny Briere’s hockey career began just as he expected — slowly.

“It was a rough start, to be honest,” Briere, the popular ex-Flyers center, said Thursday night of his move this season to Montreal. “I kind of expected that. You’re going to a new team and you’re trying to find your niche a little bit, trying to adjust to the system and all that stuff. But I feel things are coming around.”

Briere, who left the Flyers over the summer when the team made him a compliance buyout, then was gifted to a two-year, $8 million free agent offer by the Canadiens, scored just one goal in his first eight games with the Habs, then went down for 10 games with a concussion.

If he anticipated a bit of an adjustment problem to a Montreal team heavily populated with young, fast forwards, the 36-year-old Briere still couldn’t have been happy with how his start turned out.

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As he prepared for his return to Wells Fargo Center, however, Briere had reason to feel his season is turning around. Though he was without a goal in his last six games coming into Thursday night’s reunion against the Flyers, Briere had been on a run of four goals in eight games coming off his injury absence. He was a viable threat with the Habs during a super streak of 9-0-1 ... which crash-ended with a 6-0 home loss Wednesday night to the Kings.

“It’s been fun,” Briere said. “When you’re winning it’s a lot easier. The team has been on a good stretch the last three weeks, except for maybe last night — we got slapped around. But it’s been fun so far.”

What wasn’t entirely enjoyable for Briere, he said, was playing against his old Flyers teammates when the clubs faced each other at Bell Centre in October. He was expecting a similar emotional feeling for this game Thursday night.

“You get caught up playing against your old ex-teammates and your buddies,” Briere said. “That’s tough enough as it is, so I just try to focus on what I have to do and take it as it comes.”

Asked how he thought he’d react to the Philly fans who cheered his every move for the previous six years, Briere said, “I don’t know what to expect. It can go any way.”

He wouldn’t have to wonder long. A video tribute to Briere went up on Wells Fargo Center’s Sales Pitch Scoreboard at the first television timeout, and Flyers fans followed it with a standing ovation.

“Whatever happens, happens,” Briere had said in anticipation of that moment. “It’s not going to change how I feel about the city and about the fans and this organization. Obviously, if something happens I’m going to try to soak it all in.”

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The Flyers signed Phantoms guy Chris VandeVelde to a one-year NHL contract, and inserted him into the lineup against the Habs in place of Jay Rosehill. Tye McGinn, who had been recalled during the road trip to take the place of injured Vinny Lecavalier but hadn’t played, was sent back to the minor-league team, but in name only.

“McGinn got sick,” coach Craig Berube said. “Kind of bad luck for him. He’s still under the weather (with flu symptoms). We needed an extra forward because we don’t have any.”

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Acknowledging before the game that the Canadiens “are a fast team” with plenty of young legs, Berube was asked if the 7-2 loss Wednesday night to another fast team with young legs, the Blackhawks, worried him that his team might not be able to keep up against teams built that way.

“I think if you’re playing properly in your position and you’re doing what you’re supposed to do, we’re fine,” Berube said. “I thought it was fine and it got away from us (Wednesday night).”

In that ugly loss in Chicago, Berube said his players were “trying to do too much. They start trying to do other people’s jobs, they get running around and get out of position and you can’t do that. You’ve got to stay with it.”